All they're asking for is a little respect - Editorials & Commentary - International Herald Tribune

VLADIVOSTOK, Russia — Next year will mark 200 years of diplomatic relations between the United States and Russia, an occasion that America would do well to observe by offering the Russian Federation something other than high-handed reprimands.

Since the collapse of Soviet rule in 1991, the United States has consistently misinterpreted Russian intentions, gauging events there according to its own ideals and expectations rather than by the values embedded in Russian culture, among which the respect of other nations is a high priority.

So the intrusive deprecations that Vice President Dick Cheney aimed at President Vladimir Putin of Russia last month should have come as no surprise; nor, perhaps, should the hypocritical "admiration and friendship" that Cheney expressed for Kazakhstan's dictator, Nursultan Nazarbayev, just two days later.

What was startling was Cheney's deliberately provocative tone: He appeared to be spoiling for a fight on the eve of the Group of 8 gathering in St. Petersburg this July, the first to be held in Russia.

If so, it did not succeed. In his state-of-the-nation speech on May 10, Putin's remarks were restrained, as befits a prospective host. "We should not repeat the Soviet Union's mistakes, the mistakes of the Cold War years, neither in the political sphere nor in the defense strategy," Putin insisted.

In the course of six lecture tours I have made to Russia since 2003 - two of which were sponsored by the U.S. State Department's International Speakers' Program - I have exchanged views with scores of scholars, students, professionals and working-class families from St. Petersburg to Vladivostok.

This unscientific sampling suggests to me that Vladimir Putin is unanimously seen as exactly the right man for the presidency today.

While some do not like all the measures that Putin has taken, the Russians I have met are not alarmed about the same issues that worry Americans on their behalf. And they are certainly content to entrust foreign affairs to a powerful head of state.

After 50 years of Cold War conditioning and mutually assured destruction, followed by a decade of benign neglect, the United States under the Bush administration and Russia under Putin seem to be backsliding toward the competitive calculus of the arms-race era and familiar postures of belligerent mistrust.

But ideology no longer provides the basis for their antagonism, if it ever did, and neither country can hope to dominate the other in the era of China's growing trade hegemony.

An error has occurred. Please try again later.

You are already subscribed to this email.

Now the disputes center around Russia's control of its natural gas and oil reserves. As for the nuclear ambitions of Iran, if Russia produces a less bellicose response from the United Nations that is more effective than American threats, will that not amount to a diplomatic success?

Cheney seems unwilling to recognize that the Russian Federation is a work in progress, and that whatever else this nation will become, nothing resembling the Soviet Union can ever emerge again.

And despite the dark, Syriana-like dealings that doubtless play out in the petro-arena, Russia under Putin seeks to control its own destiny, not that of the United States, Europe or Asia.

That in itself is a tall order: in his latest national address, Putin addressed frankly some of the enormous problems that confront his country, including a population of some 143 million that is shrinking by 700,000 each year because of low birthrates, poverty, alcoholism and a low male life expectancy.

Yet with all the problems he acknowledged, Putin reiterated this simple demand: that foreigners be respectful of Russian culture. After all, it is not only the nation that gave us Tchaikovsky, Stravinsky, Chagall and the Bolshoi Ballet (as well as my father, Yul Brynner, the only Russian-born actor to win an Oscar).

Russia today is also the only nation that can transport humans into space and return them safely to earth. The only way that U.S. astronauts can travel to the International Space Station is by renting seats aboard a Russian spacecraft.

Russia has profound problems that must be confronted in the coming years. So does the United States. They are not the same problems and they cannot be solved by the same means - least of all by the imposition of foreign priorities. It is not through badgering that the United States can impact Russia, especially at a time when the moral influence of the Bush administration has completely evaporated.

International threats can only be addressed by international efforts. Climate change, avian flu, terrorism, nuclear proliferation and energy supplies all demand strong global collaboration from these two great nations.

By exercising mutual respect rather than double standards, the two countries can act as true partners in peace and economic development, rather than as hostile former rivals.

A version of this article appears in print on June 16, 2006, in The International Herald Tribune. Today's Paper|Subscribe